BROWNIE'S BLOG: 'GO THE BUFF.' I HOPE YOU HAVE THE WONDERFUL RETIREMENT YOU DESERVE

By Damian Brown | Monday, October 24, 2016

Buffering’s career energised racing, not only in his home state of Queensland where he was “Horse Of The Year’ on no less than five occasions, but throughout Australia where his ‘never say die’ qualities endeared him to racing fans throughout the country.

Time and time again Buffering would take on the best of opposition in any state and overseas. That willingness to go into battle, his success and his longevity all helped mould Buffering into a racehorse of rare distinction.

In this edition of Brownie’s Blog, Buffering’s jockey Damian Browne looks back at the night Buffering retired.

We all knew that retirement was not that far away for Buffering so the announcement, when it came after Friday night’s Manikato, was not a complete shock.

Buffering went out onto the track in his normal fashion ... having a good look around. He actually pulled up when we got to the barrier and just stood back and looked at the stands like he can do.

I did wonder then if he was thinking well, this might be the last time I am going to see you ...and I must admit I started thinking a little bit about that myself.

As far as the race goes, I don’t think Buffering was ever comfortable.

In his heyday, once you got out and got going he would tow you around. He would go where he wanted to and I was sort of just there for the ride ... but I had to niggle him a couple of times on Friday and we were not even going that quickly in the run.

It was like he didn’t seem as interested as he had been in the past and to me that was it was the main sign that he was starting to lose his desire.

He was a little bit similar in his previous run in the Moir.

Looking back, that was probably the first inkling I got of a change in Buff when he began better than he ever has in the Moir but was not able to muster speed and lead on his terms.

Normally he is half a length slow and then chases up and clears them easily, but that didn’t happen in the Moir.

Having said that Buffering was quite big on that occasion and still looked to have a fair bit of improvement in him.

He’d been too good a horse not to provide him with another opportunity so Rob (Heathcote) fine-tuned him for the Manikato.

This time he had no excuses so we knew the time had come.

Rob knew as well as anybody. When I brought Buff back we didn’t have to say much. We just gave each other that look knowing that was it.

I have to say the retirement decision is to Rob’s credit.

He has always said that if ever it looks like Buffering has lost his desire the plug would be pulled straight away ... you know we wouldn’t be going home trying to fix things.

After all the horse has done for all of us that simply wouldn’t be fair to him.

It is good that Buffering has retired this way.

Injury is a concern for any horse ... young or old ... but when you have a horse like Buffering who always tries so hard the injury risk is often greater.

Quite often these horses will run through the pain barrier meaning they might not show niggling little injuries.

It’s like a tough footballer. They might be hurting but they don’t show it and they battle on.

Buffering’s ever competitive nature is similar to that so I guess it is a sense of relief to everybody concerned that we have come to the end a fabulous career with a one hundred percent sound, happy horse that can go out on his own terms.

I don't think I could ever put into words what Buffering means to me, my family and to his connections.

Buffering owes us nothing. We owe him everything.

I am so proud of him.

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